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For those of you who don't know, this week in May is M.E Awareness Week.

It's so vital to raise awareness for this illness, as it's so incredibly misunderstood!

I started suffering from severe M.E nearly ten years ago now, at the age of 13, after several years of having Juvenile Arthritis, at that point my immune system was already at such a low ebb and after having a bad chest infection and then following that a case of the flu, I began to get increasingly ill. That's often how M.E (Myalgic Encephalomyelitis) begins, with a type of infection of some kind triggering off something in your body and immune system and that can lead to M.E of all different severities. Unfortunately I'm in the 25% category that suffers from the illness severely.

After being in and out of hospitals, units and nursing homes for years due to the severity of it all and the fact that my M.E continued to deteriorate; it has all certainly taken its toll on me over the past ten years.

There are such a huge array of debilitating symptoms that in my case have left me predominantly bed bound, having to be hoisted out of bed and into a wheelchair. The symptoms can range from; extreme fatigue, chronic pain, migraines, brain fog, weakness... the list goes on and for severe M.E sufferers the symptoms are obviously more severe and restricting.

For M.E to still be so terribly misunderstood is unbelievable to me, with so many people suffering from this awful illness, we still have to fight to get a diagnosis and to get any kind of recognition; it's truly baffling.

Despite my situation, I'm trying to raise as much awareness as possible for M.E, most especially severe M.E. and I've been doing that with the 'My Photo Story' series I'm working on, depicting the true reality of living with this chronic illness.

We so desperately need awareness and research to find out what can be done to help M.E sufferers, as currently there is no cure or even treatment. Hence why I'm writing this blog post, to spread that awareness further. And if you could share this post to raise even more awareness, it would be greatly appreciated.